U.S. Pat. No. 5,004,367 discloses a vehicle steering linkage including a turnbuckle assembly. The turnbuckle assembly includes a sleeve and a pair of nuts. The vehicle steering linkage further includes a tie rod having two separate sections. The turnbuckle assembly connects the two sections of the tie rod to each other. Each section of the tie rod has a threaded end portion which extends into a respective open end of the sleeve in engagement with a respective internal thread in the sleeve. The engaged threads at one end of the sleeve extend oppositely to the engaged threads at the other end of the sleeve. The tie rod sections are therefore moved axially toward or away from each other upon rotation of the sleeve relative to the tie rod sections. When a desired axial spacing between the tie rod sections is achieved, the nuts are tightened against the sleeve to clamp the sleeve against the tie rod sections, and thereby to fix the positions of the tie rod sections.
Each nut in the turnbuckle assembly has an inclined inner clamping surface, and each opposite end portion of the sleeve has an inclined outer clamping surface. When the nuts are tightened against the sleeve, the inclined inner clamping surfaces on the nuts move axially against the inclined outer clamping surfaces on the sleeve. The nuts then exert a clamping force radially inward against the end portions of the sleeve and the tie rod sections in the sleeve.